Big Gay Closet

People magazine has confirmed that TMZ is correct and the much anticipated May 5th coming out “Cinco de Gayo” celebrity is Chely Wright, a country music singer.

She did an interview with The Advocate:

For Wright, eventually the strain from years of practiced hiding—along with failed attempts at dating men and romantic relationships with women that were ultimately crushed under the weight of secrecy—left her feeling isolated and abjectly suicidal.

The turning point came in 2006, when the devastation of a bad breakup caused Wright to consider ending her own life. “I had a gun in my mouth,“ recalls Wright. “That’s a hard thing to come back from. It was really songs that saved my life. The process of writing songs—and the experience of writing down my story—that really carried me through it. When I finally knew that I could no longer go on living a lie anymore, it was over. Everything had to change. The experience of writing a book…this record, coming out I doubt I’ll ever have another experience in my life that is so dramatic and intense. It’s just been this incredible, dynamic journey for me. I’m thankful for it, but I’d never want to go through it again.”
from The Advocate

Her story will ring true for many other LGBTQ people who’ve been to the place where suicide seemed the only way out. I also love how she celebrates her journey and, at the same time, admits it’s not something she’d ever want to go through again.

TMZ has learned the big “coming out” announcement planned for this week will be … country star Chely Wright.

There’s been a big buzz over the last week as to which celeb was announcing he/she was gay … we knew it was going to be unveiled in PEOPLE mag next week.  But now TMZ knows for sure.

Wright has a book coming out this week as well — it’s called, “Like Me.”  And she has a CD coming out too — called “Lifted Off the Ground.”

The 39-year-old singer scored a #1 country song back in 1999 with “Single White Female,” when she was named Academy of Country Music new artist of the year.

Wright is the first major country artist ever to come out.  She has been romantically linked to a number of celebs, including Brad Paisley.

This is a big deal in the country world.  Chely is rolling the dice on her career … it’s unclear how traditionally-conservative country fans will react.

Interesting … she lists Howard Bragman as her publicist, who was the mastermind behind the Chaz Bono story.

via Chely Wright — She’s Coming Out | TMZ.com.

TMZ has a pretty good track record, so it’s pretty likely this is true.

Not being a country music fan, I’ve never heard of her. It’ll be interesting to see what she has to say on Wednesday.

Tracie over at Jezebel does an odds-on roundup of the possible outees for the May 5th Hollywood Coming Out Spectacular that is driving everybody nuts.

The Celebs?

Johnny Weir 1/4

Kelly Clarkson 1/1

Venus Williams 9/1

Zachary Quinto 2/3

Oprah 49/1

Queen Latifah 1/10

Well, there's that.

Bragman has been talking a lot about how it’s time a gay man be cast as a superhero. But one of our sources slipped and may have given us an additional clue about the celebrity’s identity. They used the pronoun “she” when talking to us about the mysterious upcoming guest. They quickly tried to correct themselves by going back to using “he”, but it was too late. While there are many women who it could be, we think we’ve got it narrowed it down to three, although we honestly didn’t expect any of these three women to come out this year. Additionally, Michael Musto of The Village Voice seems to think it’s a singer or someone involved in music. So, with all these conflicting clues, dear reader, your guess is as good as ours.via More on the Cinco de Mayo Surprise « BlindGossip.com.

Now this isn’t a gossip blog. And I do believe that we shouldn’t out people… however, looking at search stats, you guys desperately want to figure out who it is. And this person is voluntarily outing themselves, so… let’s speculate, shall we?

Someone tweeted they hoped it’d be Glenn Close. Now, hope is one thing but I don’t think it’s going to be the multiply married Ms Close anytime soon.

Any guesses from you guys?